Chapter 10
SAWYER
All Hank cares about after a three-mile run is bacon. Honestly, I can’t blame him.
The sky’s still soft and gray with a faint stretch of early light when we get home, the road slick from last night’s rain, his muddy prints trailing behind us through the kitchen.
He’s pacing now, his nose lifted toward the skillet like the smell of bacon might be enough to kill him if he doesn’t get a piece soon.
I lean a hip against the counter, flipping the strips with a fork while my golden retriever stares up at me as if I’m the sole reason for his suffering.
“You’re not starving,” I tell him, even though I already know how this ends.
He lets out a low, impatient whine. I sigh and tear off a piece of bacon and toss it down. He catches it midair with a snap of his jaws and wags his tail.
I shake my head and throw him another for good measure.
I got Hank from a local shelter a few months after I lost Julia and Violet, back when the house felt too big and too empty and too silent to live in.
People kept telling me to get a dog, like it was some kind of magical cure. At the time, it honestly sounded like a load of bullshit. Nothing could fix what broke in my life.
But Hank was a reason to come home. A reason to get up in the morning. A reason to open the door and walk outside when everything in me wanted to stay buried under the covers and forget the world kept spinning without them.
He gave me something I didn’t know I still needed—responsibility, routine, the quiet comfort of another living thing depending on me when I didn’t even trust myself to keep standing.
Nearly five years later, he’s still here. Still trailing after me like it’s his full-time job. Still looking at me like I hung the damn moon.
And on the days when the weight of it all catches up to me—when I feel like I’m still walking through the wreckage, still dragging it behind me—he’s the one thing that never asks me to be anything more than exactly what I am.
Looking back, getting him was probably the smartest damn thing I did. Maybe the only thing that kept me from falling all the way apart.
I look forward to our runs every morning. Even on the days Dom’s got a session lined up, I still lace up my shoes and hit the road with Hank. The runs clear my head better than anything else does.
Better than sleep, which I almost never get these days. Better than silence.
And keeping my stamina up saves me from Dom’s mouth, which is the real win. If my cardio dips, he makes damn sure I hear about it.
I check the time on the stove clock, scraping the last few bites of bacon and eggs off my plate before tossing it into the sink. The day’s already trying to outrun me.
The house is quiet, the way it always is. Tucked back from the rest of the Hart Ranch, past the barns and the noise and the steady churn of everyone else’s mayhem.
It’s big, built modern when my parents added it onto the land years ago, all clean lines and wide windows that swallow the view of the fields.
A little too big for one person and a dog. A little too empty, if I’m being honest.
I never bothered much with decorating. Never cared about it. That was always Julia’s thing. She had a way of making any place feel lived-in, warm. Without her, it’s just a lot of space I never figured out how to fill.
I make sure Hank’s got food and fresh water before grabbing an extra jacket from the hall closet. The mornings are colder lately, and it can crawl into your bones if you’re not ready for it.
When I reach for the jacket, my eyes flick up to the door across the hall. The one I locked up for good almost five years ago.
The lavender paint is still bright, untouched by time, little butterflies stenciled along the edges of the doorframe. Inside, there’s a crib that’s never been slept in. A dresser full of folded clothes that never got worn.
A room full of dreams that never had the chance to come true.
I haven’t opened that door since the day I shut it. Just slid the key onto the ledge above the frame, out of sight, out of reach, and told myself that was enough.
Most days, I walk past it without thinking. Or at least I pretend I do. But it’s there, a bruise pressed into the bones of the house, stitched into every quiet morning and every empty night.
A room that doesn’t breathe anymore, but somehow still manages to haunt the air around it.
I shrug on my jacket, glance once more at the closed door, and keep moving.
I quickly grab the two thermoses off the counter—one mine, one Wren’s—and head out to the car, Hank trotting after me until I give him a quick scratch behind the ears and point toward his bed. He gives a low, unhappy huff before settling down.
The air bites as I step outside, cold enough that I’m glad I grabbed the heavier jacket. Frost slicks across the fields, the fences, the top of my car. It’s going to be one of those days where the cold stays stitched to the ground no matter how high the sun gets.
I set the thermoses into the cupholders and slide in behind the wheel, the leather stiff with the chill. If I’m lucky, I’ll catch Wren before her session ends.
If not, well…I guess I’ll have a spare thermos of hot chocolate.
I found the mix at a specialty store down in Bozeman the last time I was there for work—vegan hot chocolate tucked between all the over-priced protein powders and gluten-free snack bars.
Normally, I wouldn’t have even looked twice. But I saw it and thought of Wren, figured she probably didn’t eat much before her sessions, maybe didn’t drink much either.
It was stupid. I tossed it into my cart anyway.
I made a batch last night just to be sure it didn’t taste like shit. And to my surprise, it didn’t. A little different, a little less sweet maybe, but still good. Better than I expected for hot chocolate with no dairy.
The engine rattles to life, the heat quick to kick in. I tap my fingers against the steering wheel, not because I’m in a hurry but because I can’t sit still with the way my thoughts keep pulling in directions I don’t want them to go.
I’m not sure why I’m doing this. Why it matters to me if she has something warm in her hands after a cold morning working horses. Why it bothers me that she usually shows up with nothing but a half-empty water bottle and a stupid protein bar.
I shouldn’t be thinking about her like this.
Not when the only woman I ever thought I’d love is buried six miles from here under a bed of white stone and frozen earth.
Not when every good part of me—the parts that knew how to love, how to plan for a future—got buried with her.
Thinking about Wren this way feels like standing on a fault line I don’t have any business crossing. It feels like a betrayal. Even if all I’m doing is handing her a cup of hot chocolate.
I glance at the cupholders again. It’s nothing. A small thing. Something anyone would do.
I check the time again on the dash and blow out a slow breath. If I’m lucky, I’ll catch her before she heads out.
The thermoses are warm in my hands as I step outside, the cold cutting across my face sharp enough to make my eyes sting and wake me up all over again.
The round pen sits a little ways off from the main barn, tucked into a patch of frostbitten earth that still remembers the heat of summer under all this early winter gray.
My dad built it years ago, poured more into it than he had to—solid steel rails, the footing just right, good drainage, enough space to work a horse properly without worrying about slipping or breaking something that can’t be fixed.
I close the gate behind me with a snap and cut across the pen, boots dragging through the cold sand that’s packed down from years of hooves and hard work.
Wren’s inside the ring, finishing up with the gelding she’s been working with—a skittish horse who used to bolt if he saw his own shadow.
Today, he moves differently. Steadier. His head is lower, ears swiveling toward her instead of away, like maybe the world doesn’t seem like such a bad place when she’s the one leading him through it.
There’s no rope between them, just a quiet understanding. One that doesn’t happen overnight. One you earn one inch at a time.
I hang back by the fence, watching her tuck the horse into his stall. She runs a hand down his neck like a promise she’s not going anywhere.
Anna’s waiting for her, notebook in hand. Wren crouches beside her, balancing easily on the balls of her feet, pointing something out with the tip of her finger, her voice low and steady as she walks Anna through whatever notes are scrawled across the page.
The morning light cuts across the pen in thin streaks, catching on her red hair and bringing out strands of gold, like the sun’s choosing to notice her first. Her long lashes frame sharp, high cheekbones, freckles scattered like they were tossed by hand across her skin.
She smiles at something Anna says, and for a second, she looks different than she usually does—softer maybe, or just a little less guarded.
Like there’s a version of her most people never get to see unless they know how to look for it.
And here I am, looking. Longer than I should. Way too damn long.
Wren stands up and brushes her hands against her pants, a quick swipe down her thighs. She glances up and spots me by the fence, a quick, polite smile tugging at her mouth before she looks away just as fast. Her focus snaps back to Anna.
They start gathering their things, Wren pulling her scarf from her bag, looping it around her neck with quick, practiced fingers while Anna hoists her notebook and coat over one arm.
Anna’s the first to pass me, her boots kicking up little clouds of dust as she walks slower than necessary. She tosses a smile up at me, one that’s more than a little flirty, her lashes batting as if she’s got something in her eye.
It’s not subtle. Hasn’t been for weeks now.